Letter about Erie School District changes is in the mail

Families with children in the Erie School District will get an education when they go to the mailbox in the week ahead.

The district has mailed copies of a four-page letter that details the changes at the Erie School District, including the reconfiguration of schools, new bus routes and new start times for elementary school students.

Copies of the letter, dated Thursday, should arrive in mailboxes on Tuesday or Wednesday, said Daria Devlin, the Erie School District's coordinator of grants and community relations.

The district administration had to wait until Thursday to send the letter because of action that took place at the Erie School Board meeting on Wednesday night. At the direction of the board, Superintendent Brian Polito decided that the district would charge no fee for a new before-school program for elementary school students.

The letter, signed by Polito, lists no fee for the program, but also details the program's registration requirements.

The letter is the latest in the Erie School District's campaign to let families know about the many changes the district undertook as part of its financial recovery plan to stay solvent. Administrators with the 11,500-student district throughout the year have been holding public forums and making announcements about the transformation.

Most recently, Polito and other top administrators discussed the changes in an interview on the GoErie.com Facebook page on Monday.

Polito, the school district's former chief financial officer, took over as superintendent on July 1. He succeeds Jay Badams, who left the Erie School District after seven years in the top job to lead a school district that serves towns in Vermont and New Hampshire.

Badams and Polito developed the financial recovery strategy that led to the reconfiguration of the district's schools, including the merger of three of the district's four high schools at the newly named Erie High, formerly Central Career & Technical School.

The recovery strategy, submitted to the state, outlined why the district needed the additional $14 million in aid it received in the 2017-18 state budget — money that Polito said will help eliminate the district's short- and long-term deficits. The district risked running out of money without the $14 million infusion.

In the letter to families, Polito wrote that his administration's focus "will be to get the district back on the path of financial stability and to increase our efforts to ensure engagement, success and growth for each of our 11,500 students."

Ed Palattella can be reached at 870-1813 or by email. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/ETNpalattella.